


Welcome Back

by embryonic_trite



Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff, Romance, Some Humor, Unresolved Sexual Tension, steroline
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-26
Updated: 2015-10-26
Packaged: 2018-04-28 06:16:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5080858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embryonic_trite/pseuds/embryonic_trite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elena’s returning from the hospital and she witnesses an oddly domestic Steroline cooking lunch</p>
            </blockquote>





	Welcome Back

**Author's Note:**

> Unedited AU story in which the ultimatum in Season 6 (life of Bonnie or Elena) didn't happen and Elena just happened to wake from a Kai-caused coma

Elena was finally discharged from the hospital. She decided to go to the boarding house instead of going straight to her home at Whitmore; they hadn’t formulated a good enough story as to why Elena had missed so many days and “I fell down” was no longer an acceptable answer (it wasn’t that the story wasn’t plausible, it was, but with the number of times she’s “fallen down” she’d start getting more questions than necessary). 

Elena ran a hand through her hair - making a mental note to have it cut considering how long she’d been away - and admired the crimson bricks that surrounded the wooden door that she was so used to seeing, memories of Stefan and Damon were clashing with that memory of Kai bashing her head in and kidnapping her. It was a little overwhelming; when she leaned her head back to look up, she hit Damon’s collar bone. 

“You okay there?” he said in his usually sly tone with a lace of genuine concern. Of course the concern was genuine, it was Elena.

She thought about arguing and reminding Damon that she wasn’t a fragile butterfly. Considering she did just leave the hospital, Damon would either laugh at her argument or take her back to the hospital to check for a concussion…or he’d do both. Instead, she just nodded.

“Am I going to be welcomed by a Caroline Forbes ‘I’m glad you’re not dead’ party?” 

Tyler and Alaric took off and Matt was still trying to get over his supernatural-hating manner (understandable but still a little annoying). Once Elena woke, Jeremy, Tyler, and Alaric came back to see her, but they weren’t convinced to permanently reside in Mystic Falls again (not to mention Elena wasn’t exactly happy to hear her little brother was secretly hunting vampires instead of at art school… whilst she was in her near-deathbed). 

Damon shrugged nonchalantly, “Vampire Barbie’s been so worried about you that she may have forgotten how to hang streamers,” he joked as he opened the door for her and carried her bloody bridesmaid’s dress inside.

“Their home,” the couple heard Bonnie shout from the living room. They did the usual - Bonnie scolded Elena for being put in danger, Elena reassured Bonnie that it wasn’t her fault just because she wasn’t there, then they both hugged - before Bonnie led her best friend inside the house.

Waiting in the doorway was a bubbly blonde who seemed hesitant to hug her human friend, but did it anyway. Caroline chastised and hugged as Bonnie had her before allowing them into the kitchen area near the fireplace, where Stefan was cooking as he offered Elena a friendly smile. 

Bonnie and Caroline decided to stay with the Salvatores when Elena Gilbert was still in her deep slumber. The Salvatore brothers weren’t exactly the worst roommates to have. They wouldn’t complain that much about dishes or laundry and they were pretty reasonable on establishing a fetching system: they would alternate turns on who picks up groceries, rents movies, steals from the “hospital deli”. Other than the fact that they both - mostly Damon - had issues with the whole knocking before entering-thing, they made the temporary arrangement for the vampire and her witchy best friend doable.

Caroline handed Elena a glass of water and a mug of blood to Damon before joining Stefan near the sink. Elena couldn’t help but snicker at the sight of Caroline grabbing a knife in front of Stefan: it made her smile at how fluent and natural their actions were too each other and Caroline didn’t even have to tell him to move or anything.

She shared glances and a silent “I want all the details” with Bonnie. 

“Hey, Barbie, I told you to have the food ready by the time we got back. You had three hours,” he said as he propped his feet on the table and rested his hands behind his head.

Instead of hearing the condescending “Damon” from Stefan, he was met with a bag of apples that Caroline threw at his head. He didn’t know which was more shocking: the fact that Caroline threw hard enough to knock him over or the fact that she had a bag of apples lying around for no reason…she and Stefan were supposed to be making spaghetti. 

Elena smirked at her boyfriend and turned back to “Steroline”. 

“Caroline, can you get me the… “ The blonde vampire handed him a spoon without looking away from her own chores. “Thanks,” he said as he began chopping onions. 

The older vampire twirled the knife between his fingers and handed it to her just as she was about to say, “Hey, I need a knife.”

Stefan dipped a spoon into his sauce and said, “Caroline could you…” his voice trailed off because Caroline had already leaned over and put the spoon in her mouth. Everyone - but Caroline - caught the way he was staring at her lips once she parted from the metal utensil. 

“Needs more pepper,” she said, “Switch,” and threw the knife in the air as they changed stations.

Stefan caught it without flinching and began pushing the vegetables into the pot as Caroline brought out all the other ingredients she needed for their sauce.

“Oh! I need…” when she turned around, he was already pushing the vegetables into the pot. “Thanks,” she said and handed him a glass of water and the pack of sausages before he asked.

Elena turned over to Bonnie and mouthed “Oh my god” before turning back to her chefs and blurting, “So all it took was me getting into a coma for you two to finally get together?”

The fact that Stefan spat out his water - missing the food, thank goodness - and Caroline dropped the knife into the pot made it obvious that Elena’s question ruined their perfectly harmonized assembly line. The older vampire was still coughing and Caroline almost pat his back to help him, but she caught the knowing glance from the other Salvatore and decided to keep her hands to herself.

“We’re not together,” Caroline defended. Stefan growling under his breath didn’t go unnoticed by neither Damon nor Bonnie.

“Then what the hell is this?” she asked and made gestures to the both of them - her flailing hands looked almost as if she was framing a heart around the two.

Caroline avoided looking at Stefan, who was trying to hide signs of frustration from his best friend by pulling the knife out of their pot of spaghetti sauce, and said, “Nothing, we’re just cooking,” she nervously put a strand of her blonde hair behind her ear, “What do you think is going on?”

Bonnie nudged Elena and said, “You should’ve seen them barbecuing last week.” Like Elena, Bonnie nearly screamed “Kiss already, you idiots” after she watched Stefan tying Caroline’s apron behind her backless - and braless - tank top or Caroline wiping barbecue sauce and blood off of Stefan’s chin whilst he was shirtless (Enzo thought it’d be funny to squirt an O positive blood bag onto Stefan’s white tank top). 

The two girls giggled and resumed watching their two friends trying to go back into their routine. That task was proved impossible as Caroline began cutting her own mushrooms even though Stefan already made a pile and Stefan was still knife-fishing.

The palpable tension was cut once everyone turned to see Damon laughing into the refrigerator as he grabbed another blood bag.


End file.
